Scope
The act explicitly applies only to executive branch government agencies. These agencies are under several mandates to comply with public solicitation of information. Along with making public and accessible all bureaucratic and technical procedures for applying for documents from that agency, agencies are also subject to penalties for hindering the process of a petition for information. If “agency personnel acted arbitrarily or capriciously with respect to the withholding, Special Counsel shall promptly initiate a proceeding to determine whether disciplinary action is warranted against the officer or employee who was primarily responsible for the withholding.” In this way, there is recourse for one seeking information to go to a federal court if suspicion of illegal tampering or delayed sending of records exists. However, there are nine exemptions, ranging from a withholding “specifically authorized under criteria established by an Executive order to be kept secret in the interest of national defense or foreign policy” and “trade secrets” to “clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy.”
Read more about this topic: Freedom Of Information Act (United States)
Famous quotes containing the word scope:
“A country survives its legislation. That truth should not comfort the conservative nor depress the radical. For it means that public policy can enlarge its scope and increase its audacity, can try big experiments without trembling too much over the result. This nation could enter upon the most radical experiments and could afford to fail in them.”
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)
“As the creative adult needs to toy with ideas, the child, to form his ideas, needs toys—and plenty of leisure and scope to play with them as he likes, and not just the way adults think proper. This is why he must be given this freedom for his play to be successful and truly serve him well.”
—Bruno Bettelheim (20th century)
“The scope of modern government in what it can and ought to accomplish for its people has been widened far beyond the principles laid down by the old “laissez faire” school of political rights, and the widening has met popular approval.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)